In this blog, Poppy Nicol, Dennis Touliatos and John Nzira report on a recent project comparing community-based seed networks in South Africa and Wales. By reflecting on their experiences they explore how farmer-led and community-based seed systems play an important role in cultivating climate resilient and just food futures. They conclude by introducing their policy brief on ‘seed systems for climate-resilient and just food futures’ which is accessible here.
Seed saving is a core component of agriculture. The saving of locally and regionally adapted seed over many millennia in farming systems has led to vast cultivated crop diversity across the world. This crop diversity has, in turn, resulted in diversity of cultural practices, particularly those connected to food.
Over the last century however, in many places across the world, there has been a profound disconnection of the breeding and cultivating of seed from farms and communities.
The seed systems that our food systems rely upon have become increasingly controlled by corporate interests. Estimates suggest four corporations (Bayer, BASF, Corteva and Sinochem) control around 51% of global seed sales. This market consolidation of seed systems has resulted in a narrowing of the range of crop varieties for global seed markets, rising costs of seeds, growth of intellectual property rights for plant breeders and accompanied privatisation of plant breeding. It is further causing widespread disruption and erosion of local seed saving practices; indigenous, traditional agroecological knowledge systems; crop diversity, and; context-specific food cultures.
During the pandemic, many commercial and community-based horticultural operations across the globe were placed under strain and faced difficulty accessing seed due to heavy reliance upon seed imports. The climate crisis and geopolitical upheavals are likely to present further future challenges to a food system heavily reliant upon globalised seed supplies.
Saving seed for just climate resilience
As a small research team of activists, practitioners and early career researchers participating in the British Council Farming for Climate Justice Programme we set out to learn more about the potential role of farmer-led and community-saved seeds in realising just climate resilience.
Drawing upon the geographical location and local knowledge of our research team, we decided to focus our research on the nation of Wales and the Vhembe District in Limpopo, South Africa. These two geographical regions face very different challenges when it comes to climate change, most notably in the form of increased periods of drought in South Africa and increasing severity of storms in Wales.
To find out more about the lived experiences of saving seed and the challenges seed saving communities currently face in these two distinct regions, we visited a total of 10 seed saving sites – 5 in Wales and 5 in South Africa. Our aim was to interview seed-savers as knowledge-holders who have lived experience and knowledge of working with seed saving in an agroecological context.
Seeds as connection to ancestors
“Every seed holds a connection to the future and the past.”
Seed saver, Vhembe District, Limpopo
In South Africa, the saving of local and indigenous seeds is considered critical for the preservation of both genetic diversity and cultural heritage amongst the seed savers we interviewed. Seeds were identified as inherited from and enabling connection to ancestors from the past, as well as sustaining cultural identities into the future. They were understood as important components of ritual practices – with offerings of seed made to give thanks to the ancestors for the harvest gathered, as well as for the harvests to come.
The safeguarding of locally and indigenous seeds, according to the South African seed savers we spoke to, is important not only for conserving locally adapted crop genetics, but also for protecting and sustaining threads of connections to ancestors. Seeds from this perspective nourish the spirit as well as the body, cultivating connections to heritage.
“I get those seeds from my mother who got them from her mother. It’s transferred from generation to generation.”
Seed saver, Vhembe District, Limpopo
“I follow my elders’ footstep and I want to bring back the seeds that have been lost. Like the seeds connect us with our ancestors.”
Seed saver, Vhembe District, Limpopo
Saving seed for self-determination
Seed savers operating in the Vhembe district highlighted how seed saving enables self-determination not only of the kinds of crops cultivated in the field but also of the kinds of foods used in the kitchen.
Pumpkin was appreciated by several seed savers as an example of a crop that offers multiple yields all year rounds – including the leaves and flowers (which can be eaten fresh and dried) as well as the fruits (which can be stored for several months).
Cultivation of pulses such as the Cow Pea and Pigeon Pea were further identified as valuable crops in the way that the drying of peas and leaves enable extension of the harvest window – including during periods of drought.
Several seed savers also noted the benefit of applying agroecological techniques such as companion planting, particularly during periods of drought. Growing pumpkin, maize and beans together is one example of a mutually beneficial companion planting approach: pumpkin leaves provide shade and help retain moisture in the soil and reduce the weed burden, maize reduces heat stress for the squash and beans, whilst the beans fix nitrogen. Combined, they support a nutritionally diverse and balanced diet and healthy soil.
Seed saving as a political and radical act
In Wales, whilst seed saving is an ancient practice, it has been largely disconnected from the agricultural landscapes of the country. For the Welsh seed savers we spoke to, reconnecting with practices of saving seed is a radical, political act of reclaiming a vital component of agriculture.
Aside from one seventh generation farmer who clearly conveyed seed saving as an inherited practice from his Pembrokeshire farm, seed saving was not an inherited practice amongst the remaining four seed-savers we interviewed. Rather, it was part of their journey of becoming an agroecological food producer.
The seed-savers we spoke to are rare individuals in the Welsh farming sector. Horticulture in Wales, like the rest of the UK, has become highly dependent upon global vegetable seed imports that are largely controlled by a small number of corporations cultivated within large-scale, non-agroecological intensive systems. Meanwhile, the area of land dedicated to horticulture is estimated at less than 0.1% of total farm area[1] in Wales. Very little of this is allocated for saving seed.
Many of the Welsh seed-savers spoke of their political motivations – to reclaim the intrinsic human right to save seed and to carve out more cooperative ways of exchanging regionally adapted, agroecological farm-grown seed.
Saving seed was presented as a way of building genetic resilience within food systems to future uncertainties such as climate change, as well as a means of breeding and conserving the kinds of crops that can grow well within organic systems.
Several seed savers highlighted the importance of growing crops that are tasty to eat! In contrast, in commercial seed breeding systems, where priority is often placed on varieties that offer uniform, consistent results for short harvest windows. As one of the seed-savers interviewed reflects:
“It’s actually one of the enormous strengths of the seed sovereignty and the smaller scale vegetable movement is that if you look at what people breed vegetables for large scale commercial growing, I wouldn’t say they ignore taste. But there are a lot of other factors that go into consideration… taste is not as high up the list as you might hope.”
Similarly to South African counterparts, some seed-savers highlighted the benefits of crops that can support seasonal extension – such as French beans that can be eaten both tender off the vine or as a dried bean.
Saving seed for community connection
Seed saving in Wales was also seen as a way of building deeper connections across the farming and wider community. As the seventh generation farmer we spoke to reflects:
“We’ve lost touch with each other. Farmers today are very much in isolation because of modern farming. We should be all working together and standing ground together.”
Farmer-led and community-based seed-saving are a vital part of creating more connected communities that can demonstrate resilience in the face of external shock.
Lessons from South Africa, Lessons from Wales
Interviews with seed savers in the Limpopo region of South Africa reveal how seed-saving is a way of connecting intimately with ancestral heritage. Welsh seed savers could learn from this in terms of looking to archives as well as working to document and embody practices from the older generations of seed savers that remain so that this knowledge lives on for future generations. An endeavour modelled by the Llafur Ni project, which is bulking out the rare Black Oat that was traditionally cultivated in West Wales and working to increase Welsh oat production.
Interviews with Welsh seed savers indicate the value of building regional, national and global training and trading networks and alliances to begin to diversify seed systems and build more opportunities for localised seed production. South African seed savers could learn from this in terms of seeing their work as part of a global movement – to reclaim the intrinsic human right to save seed. South African and Welsh seed savers both were particularly enthused about potential opportunities for connection and knowledge exchange.
Initiatives such as the Wales Seed Hub[2] (a cooperative of farmers working together to market, pack and distribute their agroecologically grown seed); Llafur Ni[3] (a Welsh group working to bulk out a rare variety of oats); the UK and Ireland Seed Sovereignty Programme[4] (a programme that offers training in seed-saving for agroecological growers), and; Ukuvuna[5] (a network that supports farmers in application of agroecological practices including seed saving in South Africa) are all examples of networks scaling farmer-led and community-based seed systems guided by the principles of cooperation and mutual support. As they proliferate, they indicate seeds of change for a more just food future in the face of climate uncertainty.
Policy briefing
Our recently published Policy Briefing further highlights a number of leverage points within policy for the scaling of farmer-led and community-based seed systems:
1) Seed savers and farmers across the world maintain and develop diverse crops and plant varieties and that are vital for climate resilience. Policy needs to enable and support farmer-led and community-based seed networks to foster climate resilient food systems.
2) Farmer-to-farmer and community-based seed systems are knowledge intensive and require mobilisation and amplification of resources to facilitate and enhance knowledge-exchange.
3) Resources need to be made available for participatory, transdisciplinary research with farmers and communities to realise climate resilient and just seed system futures.
4) A policy and legislative environment that is responsive to the diverse voices, knowledge and vision of farmers and community-based seed savers and embeds their right to save seed.
Click here for the full policy brief.
By Dr. Poppy Nicol, Wales Institute of Social and Economic Research and Data, Cardiff University, John Nzira, Ukuvuna Permaculture, and Dr Dionysios ‘Dennis’ Touliatos, Centre for Agroecology, Water Resilience, Coventry University and Lancaster Seed Library.
[1] Welsh Government 2018, Key agricultural variables, 1998 to 2018 https://gov.wales/sites/default/files/statistics-and-research/2018-12/181127-key-agricultural-variables-june-1998-2018-en_1.ods
[2] https://www.seedhub.wales/
[3] https://www.seedsovereignty.info/news/wales/llafur-ni/
[4] https://www.seedsovereignty.info/
[5] http://ukuvuna.org/index.php